Catholic Reformation, Part III: Teresa of Avila and John of the Cross
Posted by Sappho on May 14th, 2005 filed in Church History, Education for Ministry
When my lapsed Catholic husband is in a mood to speak of the Church’s positive side, he sometimes reminds me that, after all, the saints to come out of the Inquisition period were Teresa of Avila and John of the Cross – not Torquemada.
Teresa of Avila was reported to the Inquisition multiple times – you might say she was the Karl Rahner of her day. (Note: I’m picking a modern theologian who was investigated by the CDF and ultimately cleared, and who stayed in the Church – I don’t think it would be a fair comparison to call Teresa the Matthew Fox of her day.) And John of the Cross was briefly imprisoned by the Inquisition. They are now both saints, and Teresa is a Doctor of the Church (one of only a couple of women to be designated with that title).
William James, in Varieties of Religious Experience, was critical of Teresa of Avila, part of his general impatience of monasticism. He describes her as a “shrew,” with many organizational talents which were sadly wasted encouraging nuns to pointless ecstasies. I have to differ with James, though. I like Teresa. I like her combination of outspokenness and willingness to work the system to get her convents founded, I like her movement to raise among the Carmelites a purer concern for spiritual discipline, and I like her sense of humor.
Writings of Teresa of Avila and John of the Cross can be found at the Christian Classics Ethereal Library.
May 20th, 2005 at 12:48 pm
Perhaps mysticism is not everyone’s cup of tea, but it seems strange to hear two people so great in their universe described so coolly. Let me propose this:
Teresa of Jesus and John of the Cross were servants of God, lovers of God, people whom He made His friends, His saints. They were among those who illuminated and healed their time. Both were of great service in the world, but their real height was in their facing of God.
This poem was later expanded into a book by St John of the Cross. The translation is by Roy Campbell. I hope you like it.
Upon a gloomy night,
With all my cares to loving ardours flushed,
(O venture of delight!)
With nobody is sight
I went abroad when all my house was hushed.
In safety, in disguise,
In darkness up the secret stair I crept,
(O happy enterprise)
concealed from other eyes
When all my house at length in silence slept.
Upon that lucky night
In secrecy, inscrutable to sight,
I went without discerning
And with no other light
Except for that which in my heart was burning.
It lit and led me through
More certain than the light of noonday clear
To where One waited near
Whose presence well I knew,
There where no other presence might appear.
Oh night that was my guide!
Oh darkness dearer than the morning’s pride,
Oh night that joined the lover
To the beloved bride
Transfiguring them each into the other.
Within my flowering breast
Which only for himself entire I save
He sank into his rest
And all my gifts I gave
Lulled by the airs with which the cedars wave.
Over the ramparts fanned
While the fresh wind was fluttering his tresses,
With his serenest hand
My neck he wounded, and
Suspended every sense with its caresses.
Lost to myself I stayed
My face upon my lover having laid
From all endeavour ceasing:
And all my cares releasing
Threw them amongst the lilies there to fade.
May 21st, 2005 at 12:08 pm
They’re actually two of my favorite saints. I guess that didn’t come across? It wasn’t one of my better writing days when I posted this, and I was thinking more of how they speak beyond their time despite being misunderstood in their own day and since than of telling their full story.
Thanks for the poem. Here’s something else I like, from Teresa of Avila:
Nada te turbe,
nada te espante;
todo se pasa,
Dios no se muda.
La pacientia
todo lo alcanza.
Quien a Dios tiene
nada la falta:
solo Dios basta.
Let nothing disturb you,
Nothing frighten you;
all things are passing,
God never changes.
Patient endurance
attains to all things.
The one who has God
finds nothing is wanting:
God alone suffices.
May 22nd, 2005 at 1:33 am
Thank you for the response. Your blog was the first one that rang bells for me. I still have no idea what blog world is about, but it is obviously important. Perhaps you have a quality which marks out some journalists, of being able to speak to people as though they were in the room with you. There must also be a fertility of thought, and, it once seemed to me, an almost monastic kind of self-exposure of thought (not self-indulgence).
For whatever reason, it works, so far be it from me to tell you how to do it. It was not that you did not uphold St Teresa and St John, but it seemed very distant to say that one “liked” someone like St Teresa. Her writing seems so alive, direct, so uncondescending; she has that very quality of being in the room talking to us. It invites the word, “Yes!”.
This is only a second-hand report, but it carries the flavour. It describes the origin of The Interior Castle:
There was “a most beautiful crystal globe like a castle in which she saw seven dwelling places, and in the seventh, which was in the centre, the King of Glory dwelt in the greatest splendor. From there He beautified and illumined all those dwelling places to the outer wall. The inhabitants received more light the nearer they were to the centre. Outside of the castle all was darkness, with toads, vipers, and other poisonous vermin. While she was admiring this beauty, which the grace of God communicates to souls, the light suddenly disappeared and, although the King of Glory did not leave the castle, the crystal was covered with darkness and was left as ugly as coal and with an unbearable stench, and the poisonous creatures outside the wall were able to get into the castle. Such was the state of a soul in sin.”
I can not at this moment think of a more vivid and memorable, generally useful, description in Christian literature! Everybody should read at least the first chapter of The Interior Castle! No doubt I am getting carried away.
Thank you for doing what you do.